In 51 BC and 50 BC, there was little resistance, and Caesar's troops were mostly mopping up. Gallic forces won a notable victory at the Battle of Gergovia, but the Romans' indomitable siege works at the Battle of Alesia utterly defeated the Gallic coalition. This failed, and the Gauls staged a mass revolt under the leadership of Vercingetorix in 52 BC. 53 BC saw a draconian campaign against the Gauls in an attempt to pacify them. However, tribes rose up on the continent, and the Romans suffered a humiliating defeat. The next year, he went back with a larger army, including cavalry, and was more successful, setting up a friendly king and bringing his rival to terms. Upon his return from Britain, Caesar was hailed as a hero, though he had achieved little beyond landing because his army had been too small and he was unable to land his cavalry. In 55 BC, Caesar sought to boost his public image, and undertook expeditions across the Rhine river and the English Channel that were the first of their kind. In 56 BC, Caesar defeated the Veneti in a naval battle and took most of northwest Gaul. By 57 BC, Caesar had resolved to conquer all of Gaul, and led campaigns in the east, where the Nervii nearly defeated him. The Commentarii cover the Gallic Wars over a period of 8 years, beginning with conflict over the migration of the Helvetii in 58 BC, which drew in neighboring tribes and the Germanic Suebi. By winning the support of the people, Caesar sought to make himself unassailable from the boni. The Commentaries were an effort by Caesar to directly communicate with the plebeians – thereby circumventing the usual channels of communication that passed through the Senate – to propagandize his activities as efforts to increase the glory and influence of Rome. To defend himself against these threats, Caesar knew he needed the support of the plebeians, particularly the Tribunes of the Plebs, on whom he chiefly relied for help in carrying out his agenda. Such prosecution would not only see Caesar stripped of his wealth and citizenship, but also negate all of the laws he enacted during his term as Consul and his dispositions as pro-consul of Gaul. The boni intended to prosecute Caesar for abuse of his authority upon his return, when he would lay down his imperium. The victories in Gaul won by Caesar had increased the alarm and hostility of his enemies at Rome, and his aristocratic enemies, the boni, were spreading rumors about his intentions once he returned from Gaul. The Latin title, Commentaries on the Gallic War, is often retained in English translations of the book, and the title is also translated to About the Gallic War, Of the Gallic War, On the Gallic War, The Conquest of Gaul, and The Gallic War. Historian David Henige regards the entire account as clever propaganda meant to boost Caesar's image, and suggests that it is of minimal historical accuracy. Of particular note are Caesar's claims that the Romans fought Gallic forces of up to 430,000 (an impossible army size for the time), and that the Romans suffered no deaths against this incredibly large force. Book 8 was written by Aulus Hirtius, after Caesar's death.Īlthough most contemporaries and subsequent historians considered the account truthful, 20th-century historians have questioned the outlandish claims made in the work. The full work is split into eight sections, Book 1 to Book 8, varying in size from approximately 5,000 to 15,000 words. It begins with the frequently quoted phrase "Gallia est omnis divisa in partes tres", meaning "Gaul is a whole divided into three parts". The work has been a mainstay in Latin instruction because of its simple, direct prose. Concurrently, "Gaul" was also used in common parlance as a synonym for "uncouth" or "unsophisticated" as Romans saw Celtic peoples as uncivilized compared with themselves. As the Roman Republic made inroads deeper into Celtic territory and conquered more land, the definition of "Gaul" shifted. Generally, Gaul included all of the regions primarily inhabited by Celts, aside from the province of Gallia Narbonensis (modern-day Provence and Languedoc-Roussillon), which had already been conquered in Caesar's time therefore encompassing the rest of modern France, Belgium, Western Germany, and parts of Switzerland. The "Gaul" that Caesar refers to is ambiguous, as the term had various connotations in Roman writing and discourse during Caesar's time. In it Caesar describes the battles and intrigues that took place in the nine years he spent fighting the Celtic and Germanic peoples in Gaul that opposed Roman conquest. Commentarii de Bello Gallico ( Classical Latin: English: Commentaries on the Gallic War), also Bellum Gallicum (English: Gallic War), is Julius Caesar's firsthand account of the Gallic Wars, written as a third-person narrative.
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